Mother Kills Her Two Kids for Being Autistic

Saiqa Akhter, a 30-year-old mother in Irving, Texas, is being accused of strangling her two young children to death. Akhter told the 911 operator that she killed her kids -- 5-year-old son, Zain Akhter, and 2-year-old daughter, Faryaal Akhter -- because she wanted "normal kids" and both her kids were autistic.

Advertisement

Akhter has been charged with one count of capital murder in the strangling of her son Monday night. A second capital murder charge is pending for the killing of her daughter who died Tuesday night after being put on life support.

In the 911 call recording, Saiqa Akhter says, "I killed them. I killed both of them."

She then explains that the children are both lying on the bed in the master bedroom in the family's apartment. "They are not doing anything. They are just blue and they are not taking any breaths and ... their heart is not beating," she said.

She told the operator she tried first to make her children drink bathroom cleaner, but they refused. So then she "used a wire on their necks" to strangle them.

The 911 operator asked Akhter why she killed her children and she said, "They're both not normal, not normal. They're autistic. Both are autistic. I don't want my children to be like that ... I want normal kids."

When the operator asked Akhter what she was feeling, she said, "Nothing."

Police arrived on the scene shortly thereafter.

The children's father, Rashid Akhter, came to the U.S. from Pakistan in the late 1990s and married Saiqa, also from Pakistan, several years later.

Saiqa Akhter's uncle, Wasimul Haque, told The Dallas Morning News that father Rashid Akhter is overcome with grief. "He's unable to talk or anything because he is crying," he said, noting that family members are afraid to leave him alone. "He's totally broken."

Haque also said his niece had been depressed since moving into a new apartment in Irving. He said her son Zain had autism and a severe speech impediment but had been improving and was in speech therapy.

If convicted, Saiqa Akhter could face the death penalty, if sought, or life in prison without parole.

I have no words about such a crime. Just heartbreak. Total heartbreak.